1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an aircraft having a multi-body configuration in which the fuselage volume is redistributed off a configuration center line so as to improve the aerodynamic performance of low-fineness ratio, high-performance aircraft at all speeds and flight conditions. A multi-body fuselage design is employed such that the center fuselage is moved fore and aft relative to side fuselages in accordance with the speed of the aircraft.
2. Description of the Related Art
Prior art applications of multi-body design concepts are limited to the general concepts of movable wing components or nose components. Variable sweep wing designs have structural problems due to large movements required and large aerodynamic loads carried by the wing. Variable sweep wing aircraft include aircraft in which the wing rotates fore and aft on a pivot, the sweep of the wing being the angle at which the wing is swept back. Aircraft of this type include the F-111 and the F-14 fighter aircraft.
Previous studies and designs have only addressed the redistribution of volume in configuring an aircraft, and have not taken into consideration the shaping of the longitudinal body cross-section as well as the lateral distribution of volume. That is, the prior art has only considered the redistribution of the fuselage volume and not the lateral and longitudinal position of the fuselage volume. The fuselage pressure drag, which is the force due to pressure on the body, that acts in the direction of the longitudinal body axis, remains a problem.
Aerodynamic vehicles are categorized according to a fineness ratio which is the volume (v) of the vehicle divided by the wing area (S) to the three-halves power, and is represented as: ##EQU1## This equation represents the total geometric characteristics of an aerodynamic vehicle in one geometric equation. The present invention is directed to aircraft which have a fineness ratio in a range of 0.7 to 1.0.